a day of mourning in protest in tunis here thousands gathered for the funeral of a slain opposition leader amid fears of more violence and against a backdrop of a general strike that's paralyze the country. around to between main rivals france and the u.k. even wider. french. president obama's nominee to head the cia faces calls from protesters seemingly gets an easy ride from his controversial targeted assassinations program.

from moscow you're watching our kerry johnston. we start with two news here where thousands have gathered for the funeral of a second opposition leader whose assassination has led to chaos in the streets and the crisis in parliament cities nationwide are braced for fresh anti-government protests with two previous days of unrest resulting in fierce clashes between demonstrators and police well adding to the term all the country has been paralyzed by general strike. developments in tunisia and joins us live on the line now maria how big are these crowds at the funeral and what's happening where you are now. procession has now reached the cemetery carrie and we can see this procession is massive thousands have gathered today for the clear out of shock of being a very well respected man and that is one of the reasons but another one is that

people in tunisia are just shocked with what happened on one day and this is why they say this is the personal tragedy and day of national mourning the shock. vocal critic of the government in tunisia and especially over. the infamous local branch of muslim brotherhood who is dominating the ruling tunisia's to call it and this is why we are hearing lots of anti government. we we feel look to government pronouncements here and the government slogan and we've also been hearing from people we have been able to speak to now that they are accusing not only the government of the party but personally the leader of the party mr huhne new she's been responsible for the murder of. shocklee who's been one of the most prominent opposition leaders of tunisia it's and nero situation

with what we saw here two years ago during the cold arab spring revolutions tunisia was the first country and actually has been it's been doing quite well after that it's been quite calm and relatively peaceful transition to democracy and they have been the country will be ok very soon as the nation. has actually made that all these side you know wait people around on the streets again and now they have fighting against a completely different and other regime but again. protesting against governors and rulers securities concerns are. very high and this is why we see the army providing security here all around and how he called the areas people are afraid that they may go even more violence and comparing to seen here in the last two days they have

been many protests all of india since the nation not only in the capital tunis but throughout the country they have been many clashes between opposition supporters and police and one police officer died in the clashes but there have been many more injured people we've seen lots of police in downtown because the raw fear is that the procession from the cemetery may go to the main square to the main street where the interior ministry and. this is the street where the arab spring revolution here started we have been able to speak to one of the opposition leader is. obviously for the funerals of that he's told us that what the country needs right now is a dialogue between the opposition and the government otherwise more tears and more blood will come but actually we've seen already that what we're witnessing is

very very tense situation and it's a day or national strike because it is you just it doesn't help. improve the situation on the ground because the country is literally paralyzed everything is closed no one wanted. and it's a very it's a very important moment for for the country ok our to thank you very much indeed for that live from tunis for us at the heart of the story. more insight into what's happening on the ground now let's talk to ben ghazi she's a local journalist who's been following developments today since protests broke out on wednesday if you can hear us how flammable is the situation in the capital now are we likely to see a fresh outburst of violence do you think. at all from my. police. yet you came in march if you crowd came in the morning. i mean chased away by the police now there is

a lot of. call these. what exactly are people on the streets demanding now while the slogans you hear right now with this. week we can and. minister of interior resign. mainly asking for the government to go away. and how do you assess the authorities response to the crisis what have they been doing. that prime minister to. you government. has been. initiated but it was refused by now. extremists but it's not.

yesterday international consistory. division it's the opposition taking the side their membership. and trying to find. it. we'll leave it there i think about you can hear us thanks for joining us local journalist and guardian live from tunis thank you. for national whose account of events we heard there is also opposed to the latest updates on her twitter feed or developments some pictures are not underscore r.t. . it's.

the battle of the budget continues in brussels but you leaders are having a second go at hammering out a deal the main faceoff is between the u.k. and france which rival camps their supporters and opposing cuts to spending well the visions intensified after what's been seen as a snub. he didn't turn up with a meeting with david cameron on the story let's cross a lot of thought to. brussels so there's a long standing rivalry between france but as this latest episode surprised many in brussels. well not entirely and not really you're calling it

a longstanding rivalry that indeed it is even in the lead up to the summit the two have been exchanging tough words directed at each other especially when everything is up in the air at summits like these we don't have any information on what's going on even negotiations all the subtle cues. are being very closely observed by everyone around and so when at that meeting which had supposedly involved. germany prime minister david cameron as well as the commission's. also and herman van rompuy of the council and all along that did not show up of course that was interrupted by the british as a novel well by the france president said that he in fact had not received an invitation but it's been reported that one but rhomboid had been trying to call of the french president but did not get an answer well that's the. regard to whatever the big does continue it started from even before the summit as i mentioned with the u.k. leading that voice on more spending cuts on the budget cuts rather

a limiting the spending on a lot of sectors that you want to spend france on the other hand it together with the southern and eastern countries want to maintain the current fund or at least not that much say that it will threaten their economies and france also pointing a finger at the u.k. saying for a country that has been demanding spending cuts it hasn't stopped defending its rebate that's the money it gets back from the e.u. after payments essentially as compensation for farm subsidies it doesn't substantially benefit from with with all this bickering backdrop that talks continue and as of last night or early this morning there are actually already general figures of the draft proposal that the leaders are now considering we have a nine hundred sixty billion euro a budget commitment that is the ceiling amount that can be paid to throughout this period this is down for more than a trillion euros and also the other figure is the budget payments that is now at

nine hundred eight billion euros this is a number that david cameron is closely watching he says that this is a clear indication of how much money is actually going to come out of the u.k. scoffers but now that there is. a general number that is being considered that is actually just the first now trying to figure out how to divide this budget is even they agreed upon it france is very very protective of its farm subsidies and the northern countries are not happy about it they want a more dynamic budget they don't want the bulk of it going to agriculture and if they even come up with a deal the next step is the european parliament. the president of the parliament said he is not going to sign it if he sees excessive cuts so that is another obstacle that it seems that even if they come up with a deal today which there's a lot of pessimism although it is slightly moving forward. there's still that parliament step so we're not so sure of all the way to go a long day here at the. ok r.t.

says our reporting from brussels thank you. e.u. leaders are fighting over where to cut there's one item that's apparently immune from any austerity measures the e.u. is reportedly planning to spend over three million dollars to wage a so-called propaganda blitz on its critics in the social media nigel farage from the u.k. independence party says the project would violate the main principles of the repeat in parliament. they decided that they're going to train in how staff in the run up to the european elections are twenty fourteen train those people to go online to look at facebook twitter and other social media sites and to correct that's their word not mine to correct any misapprehensions that may exist about the european union and i have to say the fact that it's a parliament that is doing this that is using taxpayers' money to do this says a lot about the institutions that all what about parliaments is the person is it's

him a chair of parliament he's the speaker in westminster he's the chairman in other parliaments around the world but he and all the rest of the staff are supposed to be neutral they're not supposed to take any political position at all and the fact that the parliament has decided it's going to spend money time and resources doing this shows you that frankly they're no better than a banana republic and this is all the mcgarvie would do or someone like that so i think many people outside would be shocked by it having worked there myself for thirteen years i'm not surprised at all they are really really scared they're scared that from north to south to east to west all over the european union citizens are saying we've never voted for this thing to become the united states of europe we've never asked to have the majority of our laws made somewhere else and we want to do something about it so they're scared and they're fighting back.

brussels costly worries about its image has left many across europe speechless and frustration can be greater than. thousands of protest government cuts in its. education sector coverage of that if you like. draft a bill in the u.k. aims to clear the way for private online messages to be monitored by the government for concerns that the proposed measures are taking security a step too far. fireworks on a spectacular goal of the show round off

a day of celebration in russia's black sea resort of sochi marking one year into the most expensive but winter. break. technology innovation all these developments from russia. the future. you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else you hear or see some other part of it and realize that everything you thought you knew. i'm charging welcome to the big picture.

if you. come back or president obama's pick to head the cia has faced a tough confirmation hearing at the u.s. senate but it wasn't the lawmakers who put brennan under such trouble or for his controversial views such as his role in the u.s. drone program where the session was interrupted several times by protesters against the technology that washington uses to target suspected terrorists or human rights

groups claim the program that was created by brennan has led to widen number of civilian deaths than the white house has acknowledged protest is the hearing well like without banners like stop cia murder before the chairman all of the room cleared what happened afterwards was far from the expected grilling there's going to church you can now explains. what most people expected to hear was how does the u.s. government make decisions as to who should be on their kill list and mr brennan would certainly be the most appropriate person to ask because he is known to have been in charge of the kill list and he's known as the architect of the administration's targeted assassinations program so the question of who the drones are targeting was critical and one of the senators asked john brennan whether there should be at least some judicial oversight over those executions by drones and here's what he said none of those actions or to determine past guilt for those actions that he took the decisions that are made or to take action so that we prevent

a future action to protect american lives so the rationale that john brennan gave for not going to court is that the administration is not in the business of punishing individuals but it's in the business of preventing attacks he basically says the u.s. government could execute people for what they haven't done yet you would expect a follow up questions from lawmakers as to how the administration determines the level of threat that these people constitute let's imagine an angry yemeni man who writes in his blog dag he hates america if you can seize wife died in a drone strike and he wants to take revenge is that enough to justify him being killed by a drone there are so many questions about how the administration decides to put someone on their kill list and yet there was not near enough grilling on the part of the senators to get specific answers prior to the hearing a memo was released which the justice department handed over to congress and according to the memo the government can kill people overseas even without evidence

that they are actively plotting against the u.s. the paper states that the u.s. would be able to kill a u.s. citizen or non-citizen overseas when quote unquote an informed high level official of the u.s. government determines that target is an imminent threat to them here for also suggest that such decisions would not be subject to judicial review and outlines a broad definition of what constitutes imminent threat. everybody expected tough questions on drugs but that did not happen john brennan got away with very broad answers like the program if saving lives and that you should take the administration's word for it drone warfare its consequences and the morality of it all are up for debate in crosstalk coming later this hour we hear how drone strikes may be breeding the very terror warranties are seeking to eliminate. it's quite horrific in africa but it's getting worse i mean there's a new new drawn be a snow in nigeria close to mali so that you've got the west of african as well and

so it's trucking up so that we're going to have drawn be a says all over africa i'm not sure what to suppose really why are we doing this well isn't it. the most effective recruitment tool for insurgents in the world david what do you think about that drones are an improvement on torture drones are an appointment of ground war these are the arguments were being given and yet we didn't have a ground war in yemen we might need one eventually left with the damage the drone strikes are doing but this is we're being told that this type of murder is better then all of their human rights abuses. in the u.k. a document described by some as snoopers charter would be given another push by the government or the intelligence and security committee said the proposal detailed bills that need to help authorities track online activity of citizens and retrieve personal web data want to surf earth looks at how such measures could power up

national security. the main area of concern surrounds this the draft communications data bill and proposals in it that critics say could see the public left wide open to having their facebook accounts or twitter e-mails read anything that they visit online the websites that they gayety logs by the government now understandably those plans have proven hugely controversial with critics labeling it the snoop is charter now perhaps more concerning is the latest report by the intelligence and security committee and they'd like to see a nationwide surveillance regime implemented now the government say that they need to do this to catch criminals and stop terrorism but there's lots of the members of the public saying where are safeguards when it comes to what we do online also speak more about this i'm now joined by professor and sneakily to the director studies security and intelligence studies at the university of akron thank you very

much for joining us you're in support of the draft communications data virgil i heard you describe yourself at a recent talk stunk at the picnic if these fees and these proposals are so unpopular why are the government pushing them through all the time when government is pushing them through because the government realizes that they're needed some thirty million people use the internet to communicate with each other each day in the united kingdom people in this country fully accept that more than one hundred years. their telephone conversations are likely to be mine if they're seen as a national security risk if there is a suspicion that a particular person is engaging serious organized crime sex trafficking or terrorism the government can then institute pro as a member of the public who photo my e-mails for well if you don't want your e-mails

. you're not being gauged any kind of illegal activity your e-mails won't be productive you want if you want complete privacy don't write any letters to your friends don't speak to them on the telephone and don't send them photographs of yourself very much for joining us to fester and see if that has that is the solution maybe is the time for a big log of things hey someone is actually watching. london well or you can join the online discussion about the u.k.'s controversial communications bill on our web site head to r.t. dot com to cast your vote what you think the surveillance of people's web activities will actually lead to the top of the cutter how it stacking up so far today on our chart turned well as we can see while most of the voters thinks scramblers and encrypt will become an ordinary thing almost a third believe that people will reject the practice and fight for their rights

seventeen percent say this will result in people leaving social networks. well there's a small proportion who think nothing's going to change at all. but it's not international news in brief for you know a suicide bomber has blown himself up near a security checkpoint in the city of god in northern mali no casualties have been reported except for the bomber himself is the first case of such a suicide attack since french troops entered the country the north of which was controlled by its newest extremist france now wants u.n. peacekeepers to take over security there as it prepares to end its mission. four car bombs in iraq have reportedly claimed at least thirty one lives as local

markets were attacked in the capital and nearby city of two blasts hit a baghdad market killing sixteen people fifteen more died after cars exploded in an hour nato were targeting busy city areas on fridays has become a widespread terror tactic with insurgents. and a ferry carrying around one hundred passengers has sunk in a river in central bangladesh report suggests that people have been rescued or managed to swim ashore and schools remain missing and no immediate reports of casualties. are common in battle yes due to poorly maintained vessels and relations . how after a day of picture perfect celebrations work in russia's winter olympics host city of sochi is in full swing once again the best of spirits spread not only across russia reached as far as the u.n. headquarters in new york as it marked one year until the games welty is andrew

farber wraps up the momentous day. up to six years of relentless construction i think sort she is entering the final home straight in terms of getting prepared for these games last night to mark the one year to go you can down there was a lavish ceremony here at the olympic park there were fireworks there is also a spectacular skating show that took place in the bolshoi ice time that was all very impressive candour and culture also switched on across russia are now if you're a fan tickets have gone on sale now the cheapest ones you can think of something like fifteen dollars and if you're rich and they're not really fancy scratching a bit of cash you can pick up a ticket to watch the ceremony for something like fifteen hundred dollars i have been here for the last few days and have been very impressed with what i've seen most of the sporting venues are now up and running a mat is staggering considering most of them had to be built from scratch there was one area of concern and that was the ski jumping center up in the mountains which you can see also in the distance and. they are slightly behind sched jewel and also over budget and that store up president putin actually sack

a senior member of the russian olympic committee yesterday but overall the message is very positive this is in the daily setting i mean i'm just makes is from the black sea here people swimming in there just minutes ago i was fifteen degrees these will be the first olympics that will be held in the subtropical climate and if you're coming here to watch in sport i think you will fare really enjoyed simply because it's so easy to get around the olympic park is extremely compact which means you can walk around all the venues there within about twenty minutes which feasibly means you could watch something not the ice hockey the killing and all the skating events and then if you wanted to see on the saturday you could get on a train and within thirty minutes you'd be up in the mountains to watch the alpine events. we have it all more internationally and around thirty minutes time and after a short break it's crosstalk people a bell stay with us.